Working Wheels Still Turning
Tracking the trend
The problem with bald statistics is that they can be made to tell pretty much what anyone wants. Sales figures that are compared with last year and, maybe, the years before can look quite bad, but it pays to go back a little further, which we did: 10 years, in fact.
Although the current financial crisis isn’t over, making it difficult to predict what will happen in 2010, there is a growing consensus that the worst is behind us. If that’s the case, the 2009 dip in the Australian truck market won’t look as bad as the 2001 drop, when ute and heavy truck sales recorded only half of today’s totals.
The heavy truck market
It’s easy to cry ‘doom’ when the 2009 heavy truck market (trucks over 3.5 tonnes loaded mass) is down by 25 per cent. However, that’s 25 per cent off what was a record year in 2008 - and 2007 was also a record breaker.
VFACTS statistics show that in 2004 the new heavy truck market, as at June 30, was 13,000 vehicles; in 2005 it had grown to 14,500 sales; by 2006 it was 14,800. In 2007 sales of heavy trucks jumped to 16,500 and 2008 saw another massive leap, to 18,000. In 2009 it’s a relatively sobering 13,400, but if we’d had less dramatic jumps over the last two years, it wouldn’t look anything like as bad.
And that’s just the heavy end.
Van sales
If we look at vans; national sales as at June 30 last year were 13,300 vehicles and this year – the year of the GFC – the figure is 11,800. The van sales figure for the past six half-years has been around 11,000 vehicles, so there’s no reason for gloom in this segment.
Utes and cab/chassis trends
Two wheel drive utes and cab/chassis have averaged a half-year sales figure between 34,000 and 42,000 for the past seven years. The biggest year was 2005, with a half-year total of 42,000. In 2009 the figure was 39,000 and this year it’s 33,400. Not brilliant, but hardly disastrous.
Four wheel drive ute and cab/chassis sales around Australia, as at June 30, 2009, were just under 42,000 units, compared with 44,000 last year: not much of a drop in this segment at all. Putting the 2009 figure into perspective is the 2002 half-year total of only 22,000 sales. Since then, this high-growth segment has recorded half-year totals of 26,000 in 2003; 30,500 in 2004; 32,000 in 2005; 34,000 in 2006 and a whopping jump to 43,000 in 2007. If the market growth had progressed smoothly from 2003, we’d be delighted with the 2009 figure.
It’s interesting that 4x2 utes and cab/chassis are down 14 per cent on 2008 sales, while 4x4 utes and cab/chassis are down only 5 per cent. There’s a certain amount of substitution buying in the 4x4 segment, as many ute buyers realise that 4x4 vehicles have much better resale value and also can double as ‘play’ vehicles after working hours.
Predicting the future
Economists will continue to debate the merits of the Federal Government’s economic stimulus packages, but the increased investment allowance certainly seems to have secured stability in the automotive market. Pessimists reckon it’s a case of pulling forward purchases that might have been made in 2010; optimists say it’s compensating for a lack of activity in the first three months of 2009.
Time will tell.
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